*Originally posted 09/20/15
Todd Latiolais, Staff Attorney at CHILDREN AT RISK, discusses social health.
Social health is something that we all should have, children and adults. Basically, it’s being able to have relationships that are satisfying and functional with the people you interact with, like your family, friends, and schoolmates. It’s being able to express your thoughts without hurting others and also to listen to what others have to say. Finally, it’s being able to function in a group so that you improve your community, but at the same time create boundaries for your own personal improvement.
Environmental factors are any conditions surrounding the child that have an impact on their health. Obviously these can be positive or negative. These can include family income, access to healthcare, or exposure to drugs or guns. We stress the role of the community because, after parents, children are influenced a lot by the community in which they grow up. Poor environmental conditions lead to poor social health. Poor social health can lead to a child not knowing how to make friends or play with other children. They can feel bad about themselves or perform poorly at school. It is really important that the child’s environment is addressed.
The idea is for the entire community to come together to help raise healthy children. This includes parents, teachers, doctors, the police, policy makers, legislators and important public figures in our community. We work together to come up with programs or systems that will make the community a better environment for children.
For example, the community can make affordable, evidence-based parenting programs available for all parents and encourage parents to join. These programs can teach parents new parenting skills and ideas such as how to navigate a certain problem area with their child that they may not have known how to handle before. We stress the importance of evidence-based programs so that we know for sure these programs are teaching parents things that have been proven scientifically to improve children’s lives.
Another example was the community coming together to research the effect of the 5 billion dollar cut in public education funds. CHILDREN AT RISK worked with the Meadows Foundation and the Texas Education Grantmakers Advocacy Consortium to study how the cuts affected Pre-K. We’re also following the implementation of a bill that passed this past legislative session, HB 4, which ensures a higher standard for pre-K programs in Texas.
These and other community efforts were discussed at the 6th Annual Children’s Summit on September 17 at the Meadows Museum in Dallas. For more information, visit www.childrenatrisk.org